i've done LA city/long beach/east LA without a car a few times. their transit system is extensive and reliable, far more so than KC. my advice is to know exactly where you want to go, group those destinations geographically, and then plan accordingly (in other words, don't expect to get from LA to OC and back more than once in a day and have any time left to do things).
all of the area's transit providers are on google transit (LACTMA, metrolink, amtrak california), so that makes trips that cross service boundaries easy. they also have a lot of express buses, but i never rode them so i can't speak to whether or not they save much time.
i did feel a bit like a loner when i actually walked between destinations, but strangely the buses and trains had lots of people on them.
this is exactly what i was hoping to hear from exactly the type of person I was hoping to hear it. i'm afraid many of the people warning me against transit have probably little to no experience with transit to actually dole out advice. i understand it'll be easier with a car, but that's not really the point.
did you use any sort of unlimited transit pass while there? that's what i prefer to get whenever i use transit away from home.
trailerkid wrote:
did you use any sort of unlimited transit pass while there? that's what i prefer to get whenever i use transit away from home.
i did not, but my use of transit was very measured and planned in advance. if you plan on improvising, definitely invest in a day pass.
one little transit geek footnote: i rode the entire length of the blue line -- a great way to get to the catalina island ferry -- which at the time was the longest light rail line in the US. i think dallas now holds the record with their new green line.
DaveKCMO wrote:
i did not, but my use of transit was very measured and planned in advance. if you plan on improvising, definitely invest in a day pass.
one little transit geek footnote: i rode the entire length of the blue line -- a great way to get to the catalina island ferry -- which at the time was the longest light rail line in the US. i think dallas now holds the record with their new green line.
The red line in metro St. Louis is longer than either, according to Wikipedia. Yes it goes through a cornfield in Illinois, but still...
Los Angeles keeps popping up as a reasonable vaca compromise (i like bustling cities and mountains, and the other likes warmth and beaches). The last time I was there it was a disappointment due to weather (june gloom) and other things unrelated to the city, but I'm considering going again. I'd like to fly in and use only transit for a few days before taking off for the mountains and desert. I can't wait for the subway to the sea, but that's years away I guess...
Anyone have a feel for Long Beach? Is it anything at all like Miami Beach where you can stay in an urban setting, and walk everywhere for meals and to a clean beach? It looks promising at least. I've always heard that there are certain beaches around LA you really don't want to swim at due to prevailing currents and urban effluvium, and obviously the gargantuan port is there...
Actually, I'm curious what the best all around beach town/city is in greater LA (where you can walk everywhere, unlike Malibu).
Last edited by warwickland on Wed Dec 29, 2010 6:49 pm, edited 1 time in total.
warwickland wrote:
The red line in metro St. Louis is longer than either, according to Wikipedia. Yes it goes through a cornfield in Illinois, but still...
Los Angeles keeps popping up as a reasonable vaca compromise (i like bustling cities and mountains, and the other likes warmth and beaches). The last time I was there it was a disappointment due to weather (june gloom) and other things unrelated to the city, but I'm considering going again. I'd like to fly in and use only transit for a few days before taking off for the mountains and desert. I can't wait for the subway to the sea, but that's years away I guess...
Anyone have a feel for Long Beach? Is it anything at all like Miami Beach where you can stay in an urban setting, and walk everywhere for meals and to a clean beach? It looks promising at least. I've always heard that there are certain beaches around LA you really don't want to swim at due to prevailing currents and urban effluvium, and obviously the gargantuan port is there...
Actually, I'm curious what the best all around beach town/city is in greater LA (where you can walk everywhere, unlike Malibu).
I think there are (at least) a half dozen quasi-vibrant little burgs on the ocean going from the OC area up north. Santa Monica seems like the most fully developed (and one of the most expensive).
warwickland wrote:
Anyone have a feel for Long Beach? Is it anything at all like Miami Beach where you can stay in an urban setting, and walk everywhere for meals and to a clean beach? It looks promising at least. I've always heard that there are certain beaches around LA you really don't want to swim at due to prevailing currents and urban effluvium, and obviously the gargantuan port is there...
Actually, I'm curious what the best all around beach town/city is in greater LA (where you can walk everywhere, unlike Malibu).
not intimate like south beach at all. it's a CBD dominated by the port, so probably more like a cleaner downtown miami.
i've never had my nostrils burn like that before, which i assume is due to pollution from the port.
i spent a bit of time in hermosa beach on my last trip out there. it's a bit too PARTYTIME for my tastes, but it's walkable and there are plenty of cabs roaming around at night. i'm not a swimmer, though, so i can't attest to any water quality issues. you could probably find a short-term apartment rental (don't remember seeing any hotels along the main drag).
DaveKCMO wrote:
not intimate like south beach at all. it's a CBD dominated by the port, so probably more like a cleaner downtown miami.
i've never had my nostrils burn like that before, which i assume is due to pollution from the port.
i spent a bit of time in hermosa beach on my last trip out there. it's a bit too PARTYTIME for my tastes, but it's walkable and there are plenty of cabs roaming around at night. i'm not a swimmer, though, so i can't attest to any water quality issues. you could probably find a short-term apartment rental (don't remember seeing any hotels along the main drag).
Interesting. I have not problem with the diverse brand of Miami Beach partytime, if HermBeach is like that I'll be fine. deutsch>douche.
DaveKCMO wrote:
not intimate like south beach at all. it's a CBD dominated by the port, so probably more like a cleaner downtown miami.
i've never had my nostrils burn like that before, which i assume is due to pollution from the port.
i spent a bit of time in hermosa beach on my last trip out there. it's a bit too PARTYTIME for my tastes, but it's walkable and there are plenty of cabs roaming around at night. i'm not a swimmer, though, so i can't attest to any water quality issues. you could probably find a short-term apartment rental (don't remember seeing any hotels along the main drag).
Pretty sure Long Beach is where most most of the goods from China arrive.
Can I get some input of taking SuperShuttle vs taking a flyway to Union Starion >> Orange Line rail to get to OC area? I'm leaning toward the SuperShuttle
GRID wrote:
I've done LA without a car! You just take the light rail down to Long Beach and charter a helicopter to take you all over LA! Seriously. It's awesome
My LOL moment for the day. indeed.
“Give up money, give up fame, give up science, give the earth itself and all it contains rather than do an immoral act.” —Thomas Jefferson (1785)
LA mostly made me want to visit Mexico City. That's not really insult, but I think it might reveal of good deal more about how to really understand LA.
I got a pretty full circle LA experience in that we went sans car for a few days and then I drove around LA, Santa Monica, Hollywood and Orange County . The transit from OC > LA is really not bad at all. We didn't take the orange line rail, but opted for an express bus which was pretty handy. One very big difference between LA/OC transit and KC is the hours. LA/OC seems to run very consistently and very late relative to KC. Even if you're in the 'burbs you don't really have to worry about your last bus departing at 5 PM like you would in KC. Like I said...we watched Jimmy Kimmel tape @ 7 PM, went to In-N-Out, and got back on transit to go to Orange County. It was pretty easy and simple to understand. Very little actual walking was needed to accomplish this and all transfers were right on time and worked like a charm.
And the transit is LA proper seems decent enough for its built environment, but they need to build that rail/subway to Santa Monica ASAP. That really seems like it's a key to freeing up at least a little of the truly horrific traffic that was moving eastward into the Hollywood area in the afternoons while I was there. They also need to better connect the airport to Hollywood. Maybe create some Flyaways going there as well?
Transit in Orange County (on the other hand) was a complete nightmare. Not in the same sense as JoCo whatsoever because OC transit blows JoCo out of the water. OC probably has more daily riders than KCATA. It's a viable system, but one that needs some major overhauls. Express buses or even something like MAX within the county seemed virtually non-existent. I didn't get on the orange line. All the bus routes will eventually get you where you need to go, but at a painfully slow pace. We took the 43 south into Newport Beach along Harbor and the bus literally stopped at every single stop. I think it took an hour and a half to go 11 miles along mostly one street. I am a mass transit person, but after we took a round-trip on that bus ride from hell I rented a car immediately for the next day. And their commercial strips in the suburbs were just as god-awful than what I've seen in Texas-- if not worse. Orange County is Texas suburbs with a coast.
One thing that really impressed me about the LA area was the people. Holy cow people are nice and work hard! You go in a taqueria and someone is just completely busting his ass to give you good service. A lot of the people just seemed happy to be doing their jobs and really acted like they cared about what they were doing. That's not a slam on KC because I think we're on another level than the service you get in Omaha or Des Moines, but it just seemed like the competition and huge immigrant population make a lot of folks work harder. I cherry-picked a little by using Yelp, but still...all the service related folks I encountered get an A+ (bus drivers to servers to hot dog vendors). Lots of friendly folks out there...
Diversity was also incredible out there. I think KC city is fairly diverse, but a lot of LA and even OC almost felt like a different country to me (as a pale, white, male). But i just couldn't stop thinking..."Doesn't a metropolitan area with such a strong diversity deserve a better built environment?"
I was expecting LA/Hollywood/Santa Monica to have become a bit more dense and built-up. It really seemed like a horizontal collection of small cities. There was little to no flow between most neighborhoods and municipalities and the only thing really vertical seemed to be billboards for motorists. A lot of streets just seemed like to be somewhere to sit in traffic and gaze at billboards while you wait to get to your destination. And I think many of the notable small pockets have charm. But they're really charming in a much more insular, non-urban way. Kind of like if you tacked a bunch of interesting, little cities together in a metropolitan region and then covered it in freeways and traffic. There didn't really seem to be a sense of connection, but more like "this is my removed little burg." And don't even get me started on how this sort of planning has just ruined such a premium part of the country...
I think I could easily live in LA because of the people, the food, the weather, the culture. I don't think the cost of living there is a good value whatsoever, but I think I *get* the allure. But I'd say it's equally as frustrating as somewhere like KC if one cares at all about urbanity.
Last edited by trailerkid on Wed Feb 23, 2011 10:32 pm, edited 1 time in total.
thanks for the report. every time i've been there it seems i have completely different experience. forget about texas being a whole other country... LA is a whole other country!
DaveKCMO wrote:
thanks for the report. every time i've been there it seems i have completely different experience. forget about texas being a whole other country... LA is a whole other country!
I agree, L.A., and the culture in Southern California is nothing like the Midwest. Not a bad thing at all, but just different.
skim82 wrote:
I agree, L.A., and the culture in Southern California is nothing like the Midwest. Not a bad thing at all, but just different.
SoCal did teach us that we need to drive absolutely everywhere and spread out our developments as much as humanly possible. That's one aspect in how most of the Midwest is very similar. I love how SoCal will put a PetCo steps from the ocean.
i'm afraid many of the people warning me against transit have probably little to no experience with transit to actually dole out advice. i understand it'll be easier with a car, but that's not really the point. 
